


This Isn't Home Anymore

by QuinnTheKid



Category: Hermitcraft RPF
Genre: Character Death, Suicide Attempt
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-22
Updated: 2020-11-14
Packaged: 2021-03-04 02:47:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 10
Words: 20,860
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24866317
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/QuinnTheKid/pseuds/QuinnTheKid
Summary: A peaceful day suddenly turns into a nightmare as the hermits get sucked into a world so familiar yet so strange, but there is no time to get used to their new surroundings as danger lurks behind every corner.Some are not who they say, some are exactly who you expect.However, the end, will come for us all.This is inspired by ''And the universe shifts'' so check that out before you read this!
Comments: 68
Kudos: 245





	1. An unfortunate event

The wind was beating softly against the trees, making the slender man shiver where he stood on the roof of his house. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath, letting his shoulders drop as he exhaled. The smell of the ocean all around him.  
His blond hair fell into his face, it had become long and rugged with years of not getting it cut properly. The sun was setting over the horizon as he thought about his final moments.  
This was not how he had imagined it would end. Though he felt rather free where he stood. 

The last five years had been rough, horrible things had happened to him, things he never wanted to think about again. The grief had been the hardest to deal with. Loosing the people he loved had been so, so hard. Even thinking about it made tears form in his eyes. 

*does it hurt?* he muttered, not really talking to anyone in particular. 

He looked back at the world, at the things he had made, everything he had accomplished. It was all about to disappear, well, so he thought at least. He didn’t know what happened to the worlds he left, the countless games he had beaten. 

He used to travel from world to world, often killing the ender dragon in less than a day. After a while it started to feel like a chore, doing the same thing over and over again. Fighting felt like second nature, he didn’t even care about regular mobs anymore, they stopped being a threat a long time ago.  
Eventually he got sick of running. So he decided to stop and build a house, after the house was built he continued to play the game as it was intended for three whole months. 

But alas, all things must come to an end.  
As his gaze scanned the area one last time, he took a step forward, falling over the edge of the roof. The breath caught in his throat as he plummeted towards the water below.  
Time seemed to stand still. 

His mind was racing as he thought about what would happen when his health dropped to zero. Would he appear in another world? Or perhaps he would be lucky enough to escape this hell altogether? Though it didn’t really matter.

He hit the water with so much force his breath was knocked from his lungs, the cold water immediately seeping through his clothes, pulling him into the depths below.  
Closing his eyes for one final time he prayed. 

``if there truly is a god, please have mercy on me, please, just let this be the end``


	2. A very strange day

Mumbo wiped sweat from his forehead as he sat in front of his computer. The uk had been unbearably hot the last few weeks and he was silently begging for it to be over.  
He took a sip from his water bottle and leaned back, stretching his arms and back, sighing with pleasure as his joints popped.

It had been a long day, he’d worked on his base for many hours, going back and forth trying to come up with something that looked good. He had a vague idea of what he wanted it to look like, but it had still taken up most of his day as he had to rebuild it several times. 

Building had never been his strong suit, he preferred working with redstone since it was logical and therefore made sense to him. When building there was no wrong or right, you have to be creative and its all about details and things he didn’t understand.

Redstone has rules, each object has a certain amount of things it can do, and you just got to place the blocks in the right places. Of course you need some creativity to come up with the concepts etc, but its still all based on logic. 

Despite his struggles he was pleased with the progress, he’d been dreading making the tower in the middle of his base from the beginning of the season and it felt good to get started on it. Kinda made the project seem easier.  
The mega base was really starting to come together and he was exited to see it finished, though that wouldn’t be for a long time. 

The new hermitcraft episode was due the next day and he wanted to do something fun to put at the end. An idea struck his mind as he was thinking and logging back into the game he pressed tab to check if Iskall was online.

“Bingo” he said, a wide grin spreading across his face as he saw the Swedish mans little face on the top of the screen. He opened chat and typed out a message.

“Iskall, challenges lol?”

He headed off towards the hermit challenge area, thinking Iskall would have no problem understanding the message. About a minute passed before he heard a rocket and saw the Swede flying above him. Mumbo grinned and logged into a chat room waiting for Iskall to join him and a second later he heard a ding indicating that the Swede had entered the chat.

``Hallo?``

Mumbo smiled at the Swedes accent.

``Hey man, hermit challenges?``

``hermit challenges!``

You could practically hear Iskall’s smile from the way he talked. It was always fun to play with the Swede, he had the most contagious laugh and it made Mumbo hot with glee whenever he heard it.  
They had been playing together since season 4, and the last few years had been filled with ridiculous shenanigans, pranks and many, many laughs. 

``not gonna lie, this might be the hardest challenge I've given yet`` he told the other, thinking maybe he would get something better than ‘get gooder’ if he told him he had planned something extra hard.

``really? Well you’re not getting of easy either dude``

Honestly he hadn’t thought of a challenge yet, he just wanted to do something fun at the end of a long day. 

``nah mate, no challenge you could give me is too hard``

``you couldn’t even tame a parrot man!``

Mumbo laughed at that, the memory flashing in his mind of a chicken he renamed `parrot` quite genius if he did say so himself.

``you’re still mad that my parrot was bigger than yours?`` he laughed, Iskall joining in.

‘’ anyway, you ready?’’ Mumbo looked at the Swede, quickly scribbling something down on a piece of paper and putting it in a dropper. The Swede copied him and shot a sly grin as he placed his piece of paper in a different hopper. 

‘’Yeah dude, this is going to be mega!’’

They counted to three and pushed the button on top of the hoppers. The papers flying out and landing in front of their feet. 

Mumbo picked up his note and looked over at Iskall waiting for the shorter man to read his out.

“ spend an episode hating iskallium and loving diorite”  
The Swede looked between the paper and mumbo.

“That’s evil man” Iskall scowled, his hatred for diorite, or ‘bird poop’ as he called it was something he was well known for, so giving him this challenge was perfect.

“No I’d say that’s a fair challenge!” Mumbo smirked, looking down at his own note having totally forgotten that he had to do a challenge as well.

“ give everyone on the server a mob head of your choice with curse of binding”

Iskall laughed, which made Mumbo laugh as well.

“Its going to be mega dude! Imagine everyone with different mob heads!” The Swede giggled, clearly proud of the challenge he’d come up with.

“Honesty that’s very funny” he said holding back another burst of laughter. 

They both threw the paper into the fire to accept the challenge. He would have to figure out what heads to give the different hermits later, cause right then he was completely burnt out. Playing Minecraft for a whole day as his job might seem like a dream, and to be honest it was, but it was still draining and he really needed a break from his computer. 

After making sure the computer was off he went to go get something to eat before going off to bed.

He got very little sleep that night, the air had been so hot he’d been trashing around trying to get comfortable. The bed sheets were stained with sweat so he ripped them off and tossed them into the washer.  
He rubbed the sleep out of his eyes and walked into the bathroom. The floor was cold beneath his feet and a small part of him wanted to lay down and let it cool his body.  
Instead he hopped in the shower, a sigh escaped his mouth as the cool water ran over his body. He wasn’t used to heat like this and he much preferred colder weather. 

After the shower he felt refreshed and he proceeded to brush his teeth and get a bite to eat. As he sat there, thinking about the day prior he heard a sound from his office. 

That’s weird

He thought and got up to investigate. 

His computer was running, which was strange since he was pretty sure he hadn’t left it on. Shrugging he sat down to turn it off, but when he pressed the off button nothing happened. He pressed it again, still nothing. So he opened up the processor to see if anything was preventing it. His gaze flickered across the screen looking for something out of the ordinary.  
Nothing seemed out of place, except he was still logged in on hermitcraft. He definitely remembered logging out before he went to sleep, and it was not like him to forget to turn off his computer.  
He went to log out, but thought he might as well check if his farms had done anything while he slept.  
He shifted in his chair, feeling a bit uncomfortable as he was still sure he had both logged out and shut down the computer before he slept. 

“Maybe the heat is getting to me” he chuckled.

He went through the chests in his industrial district, pleased to see that the farms had been pumping out resources all night. 

RenTheDog: “wow a lot of people on rn, what’s happening my dudes?”

The message popped up in chat, puzzled he hit tab to check, and to his surprise he saw every singe hermit was on. This almost never happened because of time zones and the fact that they all had lives outside of their computers. 

Iskall85: yeah, I don’t know why I’m on though, I’m very sure that I logged out yesterday, and when I checked now I apparently logged back in an hour ago even though I was sleeping.

That comment was especially strange as the same thing had happened to him. He quickly typed out a reply.

Mumbo: yeah same thing here, I’m so sure I logged out and shut off my computer, but it was running when I woke up. 

As he waited for the others to reply he decided to head over to the shopping district. Might as well see if any of the hermits had bought anything. He landed outside his shop, but right when he was about to enter a message popped up in chat. He stared at it in shock. It shouldn’t be possible, yet there it was.

Grian joined the game.

He blinked, feeling more confused by the minute. He thought about it for a minute, then his whole world started spinning. He felt sick to his stomach and as if he was going to throw up. Gasping he stumbled out of the room heading towards the bathroom. He’d never felt anything like it and it worried him that he didn’t know what it was. Before he reached the bathroom a second wave of pain hit him and he fell to the ground, clutching his stomach. 

Then, as sudden as it appeared it was gone. He slowly sat up, careful to not move to fast in case it came back.

Though if he thought what had happen so far in the day was weird there was nothing that could prepare him for what he  
was about to see.  
“What the hell”


	3. A stranger appears

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This has mentions of suicide, but only in the very beginning so you can scroll down to where it says “what the hell” to skip it

Grian stood still for a moment, emotions pulsing through his body. He was angry, so very angry. Tears were flowing down his cheeks and his breath came in short gasps. 

His attempt at suicide had failed. He thought if he died maybe he could escape, but no. 

He was still there.

His legs gave away under him and he sank down onto his knees, the cold damp grass seeping into his jeans and the morning sun painting his hair with gold.

“Why are you doing this to me!” emotions spilling over and taking hold of his body made him scream out in pain.

“I just want to go home”

His entire body shook at the words.

What even was home anymore? 

The real world felt so far away.

Would he even know how to live if he went back? If he somehow managed to find a way?

Grian sat there for a while. Tears streaming down his face and onto his shirt. He trembled as the awful truth started to settle. 

This had supposed to be his final attempt. He’d tried everything else and dying had been his last option. So what was he supposed to do now?  
Would he be stuck here forever? Doomed to stay in his own personal hell for all eternity? 

Maybe he had died all those years ago, and this was a cruel trick from god. Maybe he was being punished for spending so much time playing video games. 

A sad smile spread across Grian’s face as he thought about his life before they had come here. He had thought what had happened in the real world more times than he could count. Had he died? Had he just disappeared from existence? Or maybe he was in a coma, waiting for the day his family would pull the cord. 

He wondered if they missed him. Did they think about him still? He knew he did. There hadn’t been a day where he didn’t think about getting out. Getting to see the people he loved again. Oh and his cats, he missed them so much.

“What the hell?”

He almost didn’t catch the voice while being wrapped up in his pain. Twisting his head around he tried to see who it belonged to. 

“Hello?” 

The voice sounded again, closer this time. 

Grian stood up, wiped the tears from his face and looked at the man who had appeared in front of him. 

And for the first time in years Grian lay eyes on another human.

He’d entered the game along with 11 other people about 5 years ago. They had been confused, scared. Nobody knew what was happening or if any of it was even real, but they all had one thing in common. They all played Minecraft on a daily basis, and they all knew they had to survive.  
So they had started playing, they gathered materials and built huge bases. They had completely transformed the world. To say he was proud of what they had made was an understatement, it had been breathtakingly beautiful. 

Though as with everything he did in here it had to end.

He shook his head at the memories. Feeling the same hopeless feeling he had done that day.

His gaze flickered over the man standing a few meters in front of him. The guy was tall, about a head taller than Grian. He was wearing a black suit with a red tie, not really the best attire in this environment. Though it was a nice fit, the fabric showing toned muscle underneath. His black hair and mustache were neatly styled and slicked back, not a strand out of place. He looked good, well, better than Grian anyway. Not that it would take much with the state he was in.

The mustached man locked eyes with him, making the shorter blonde stiffen. Nobody had looked him in the eyes for a long time. 

“Who are you? And where are we? Am I dreaming?” The man paused, staring at Grians red puffy ‘I just cried’ face. “Are you okay?”

He was taken aback by the flurry of questions, he didn’t really have much recent practice in talking with people. 

“I’d like to know the answer to some of those questions myself”

He retorted, his voice cracking from lack of use. He thought about the last question, and the answer was probably no. Though he would never admit it. 

“What I do know is that we are currently in Minecraft believe it or not”

The man stepped back, drawing in a breath of air his eyes revealing disbelief.

“What?” The mustached man stared at him in shock. “That can’t be true”

Grian chuckled, relaxing a bit as he stared at the other.

“Yes, it is. now, who are you? What’s your name?” 

=============

Mumbo stared at the man ahead. The guy looked insane, his hair a rugged mess and his clothes were dirty and tattered.  
He was shorter than mumbo, and he was wearing what he assumed used to be a red shirt with blue jeans, which both had holes and stitches. 

The guy had dirty blond hair that fell down to his shoulders, it was choppy, as if he’d taken a knife to it and just hacked away.  
Even though he looked like a mess his eyes revealed years of wisdom and his rough hands showed he’d been working hard.

He didn’t know what to think of what he’d just been told. His first instinct told him this wasn’t real, it had to be a dream. He tried pinching his hand, the thing people always said you could do to check if you were dreaming, unfortunately for Mumbo, it hurt, which meant it was, in fact, real.

“I’m Mumbo” he said, answering the others question, uncertainty clouding his thoughts, struggling to make sense of what was happening. 

“Well hello Mumbo, I’m Grian, what brings you here on this fine day?” 

He felt his shoulders relax and he laughed nervously at the joke.  
Grian gave a small smile, reaching out to shake the taller mans hand. Mumbo took it, feeling the hard callouses on the blondes hand. 

Grian looked as if he’d been crying, his eyes were puffy and his skin was still moist from the tears, but based on how he’d responded and the fact that Mumbo didn’t know him he kept quiet about it. 

“Well, I know this sounds crazy, but I was just in my office, doing some stuff in Minecraft when I got this massive headache. I think I might’ve passed out and then I woke up here”  
He scratched the back of his head, feeling warmth spread across his face and his body displayed the embarrassment he felt. 

Grian however didn’t look surprised at all, he just stared at him, thinking about what he’d just said. Then he looked around, taking in the surrounding area.  
Mumbo looked around as well, surprise creeping up his spine as he realized where he was. 

“This is the shopping district” he mumbled.  
“I have to be dreaming, there is no way in hell this is real” he looked at the blonde with huge eyes. Understanding shone on the others face, as if he’d experienced the exact same thing.

“This is probably hard for you to take in, hell I thought I was insane when I first came in and I wouldn’t blame you for feeling the same way. I promise I’ll explain later, but right now I need to ask you a few questions.”

The blond waved his hand telling mumbo to follow him. They walked over to a couple of barrels. The fabric of his clothes tugged awkwardly as he sat down and he realized he was wearing a suit, which oddly enough reminded him of his Minecraft avatars clothes. 

“So” grian said, looking away from mumbo, his hands folded across his chest with an expression the taller man couldn’t read.

“You recognize this place?” The blonde looked over at him, his brows furrowing. 

Mumbo looked around, confusion clearly visible on his face. He rubbed his hands on his pants and took a deep breath, feeling the chilly air blowing through his hair.

The surrounding area was definitely the shopping district, he recognized the blocky buildings littered around all over the place. There was no order to the place, people could just build wherever they wanted which had left the place looking like a total mess. 

“Yeah, this is the shopping area from the Minecraft server I play on, but this can’t be real. There is no way I’m actually here.” He looked down on the blonde, waiting for his response. The shorter man looked straight ahead, not giving away anything.

Grian sighed and shoved his hands in his pockets.

“I know it sounds crazy, but yes, you’re actually here. This is very much real.” He looked up at Mumbo, defeat written all over his face. He looked.. broken? What had happened to this man?

“I got here 5 years ago” grian continued, looking down again, his lip trembling. He shook his head before continuing.

“I didn’t know what was happening, none of us did, we just figured we had to survive” a tear fell from his cheek and he quickly wiped it away.

Mumbo let out a breath air, having a hard time to take in what the blonde had told him. 

“Anyway”, grian huffed, looking away towards the horizon where the sun was still rising.  
“Are there a lot of people on this server?” 

“Yeah, quite a lot actually” Mumbo responded, thinking about all the people who had joined over the years. They were like a family, always having fun and playing together. He had so many good memories with all of them and he couldn’t dream of a better group of people to have in his life.

“Well then, guess we should go find them, it’ll get pretty dangerous at night and we don’t want anyone dying on us” the shorter man said, standing up and shaking his legs in turn.

Dread filled his belly as he thought about the others hermits being here as well, and he struggled to push away the panic he felt from hearing that they could possibly die.

“Yeah no that probably wouldn’t be good” 

Grian tapped a watch like thing on his wrist and a transparent screen popped up. He was looking at something Mumbo couldn’t see. 

“Looks like nobody has figured out the WOC yet, doesn’t matter though, we can find them with the compass”  
Mumbo didn't know what he meant with the compass or the ‘WOC’ though he didn’t question it, as he thought Grian must know what he was doing since he’d been here for so long.

Mumbo felt very overwhelmed where he stood. He’d always been a nervous person, he didn’t deal with new things well, and he really didn’t like to not know what was going on. And it didn’t make the situation better that his friends could get potentially hurt while he was standing there doing nothing.

He looked back at Grian, who was now looking as confused as Mumbo had been earlier. His brows were furrowed in a tight knot and he was chewing on his lip.

“Xisuma, Tango... is this” he struggled with the words, waving his hand trying to get the thought to come to mind.

“Is this Hermitcraft?” The blond asked, looking utterly confused and shocked. 

Mumbo stared at him, surprised, he didn’t know how the blond could know them, especially if he’d been in here for 5 years. 

“Yep, it is. Well, that’s what it looks like to me anyway, do you know us?” 

“Yeah, I do. You’re the redstone guy then?” 

Mumbo chuckled, of course he would be remembered as the ‘redstone guy’ he wasn’t exactly known for much else. 

“Yep that’s me, the redstone dude” he smiled at the smaller man, feeling hot with embarrassment from being recognized.

Grian looked at him thoughtfully, “I used to watch you. It’s been so long though I don’t remember much.” He shrugged, looking away again, his gaze distant. 

The taller man looked down at the blonde, he couldn’t imagine what Grian must have gone through, but at least he could try be there for him now and help him deal with whatever it was.

He got a sudden feeling of protectiveness, the small man beside him looked so broken, so hurt, and Mumbo felt a need to know he was safe, to know he was alright.

“So” grian continued, breaking into Mumbos thoughts “Keralis and Scar appears to be the closest according to the compass, and if we want to get everyone by nightfall we should probably start walking” 

The shorter man grabbed Mumbos hand, shooting sparks up his arm and making his cheeks burn with heat. 

Mumbo sighed, knowing this would be the strangest day of his life so far

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all so much for reading!I appreciate you all so, so much! I really didn’t think this would get any attention, but you all proved me wrong😊  
> I hope you’ll enjoy this chapter as well!
> 
> Also I’m very exited to keep writing this, but unfortunately I work a lot so I don’t have much time to update this as often as I’d like. Still, I’ll be writing as much as I can!
> 
> And thank you all for the nice comments, I almost cried from all the nice things you said😭


	4. And then they were four

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all so much for the nice comments and for the kudos <3

Keralis walked along a path made of both mycelium and bright green grass. It was a unusual sight, seeing the gray/purple almost dead looking ground side by side with the regular grass. 

The place was littered with buildings of different shapes, styles and colors. Seeing the area made his belly crawl with delight and his mouth curved into a wide grin.

The place was obviously the shopping district from the Minecraft server he played on, so he figured he must be having a lucid dream, which was pretty cool. He’d never experienced a dream like this before and it felt rather strange to know he was asleep. 

The path stopped abruptly, ending in front of the mayor house. He climbed the steps to see the throne. It was a giant chair made up of diamond blocks, towering high above the ground.  
The light reflected off of the shiny surface, littering the walls with specs of light.

His gaze travelled around the room, taking in the beautiful sight, it was a great build.  
The whole mayor thing might have started as a joke, but it was a great addition to the server, and he was exited to see how the new mayor would transform the island

As he was staring at the throne he heard a groan from the side of the room. Frowning he went to investigate the sound. 

“Ugh, hello?” 

A small voice said as Keralis rounded the corner, he looked down at a brown haired man in a suit that highly resembled the outfit the mayor from power puff girls wore. He chuckled at the thought.

The other man was splayed out on the floor, holding himself up on his elbows. 

“Oh, hi there” the man grinned, shifting into an awkward sitting position

Keralis recognized him as goodtimeswithscar, or Scar for short.

“Hello Scar!” He piped, shooting him a friendly smile.

“What are you doing in my dream?” He asked, raising an eyebrow as he knelt down beside the other.

“What do you mean your dream, this is my dream, I think?” Scar retorted, looking pretty confused where he sat.

That puzzled him, how could dream Scar think he was real?

“What, how can we both be dreaming” he asked the other.

“I don’t know, but what I do know is I need help to get up” scar looked up at him, a crooked smile on his face.

Keralis smiled, poking one of his legs. He looked back up at scar, raising one eyebrow at the brown haired man.

“Not used to walking are we?” He giggled, Scar scowled at him, but took his outstretched hand, pulled himself up on unsteady legs and grabbed wall to support himself.

Scar huffed, brushed of his pants and looked around the room, his eyes widening as he realized where he was.

“Hm, so we’re both dreaming, that’s wired” Scar grinned, looking into Kerialis’ eyes and they both laughed.

“Well let’s enjoy it while we can!” He said, grabbing Scars hand again and pulling him towards the steps leading down to the shopping area.

Scar smiled, letting the short brunette drag him along.

==========

Aside from being fairly confused, Scar was having fun hanging out with Keralis. As he was bound to a wheelchair when he was awake it was cool to be able to walk when he was dreaming, though he stumbled a lot from not being used to walking and not rolling around in his wheelchair.

They travelled around the area, Keralis running from side to side, yelling at Scar to hurry up and look at whatever new fascinating thing he’d spotted. 

Scar mostly admired the buildings, and he mentioned a few things he wanted to change about the place now that he was in charge of the district. He had a lot of terraforming and building to do, but he looked forward to it. Keralis also seemed to enjoy him rambling on about the projects he had in mind, nodding vigorously at everything he said, grinning widely.

As they turned a corner he stopped abruptly, Keralis bumping into his back.

“Hey! Why’d you stop?” The shorter man popped up beside him, glancing at his face. Then, followed the taller mans gaze to see two other people, one tall, pale and with his signature look; a mustache.   
Scar didn’t recognize the other. He was short, with long blond hair, he had on a red torn shirt and blue jeans. 

The taller man, who scar recognized as Mumbo, waved,   
shouting for them to come over.

Scar shrugged, thinking it was strange to see so many people he knew in a dream as he usually just saw random people, but before he could think anything else Keralis ran towards the other two men. 

“Hello Mumbo! You’re in my dream too, that awesome!” Keralis chirped, his smile beaming as he hugged the mustached man. Scar approached more slowly, eying the stranger who was staring down at a blue screen above his wrist. 

“Hey mates!” Mumbo said, giving Scar a hug as well. 

“Fancy seeing you here! We don’t have much time to chat since we need to get the others as quick as possible.” Mumbo said, scratching at his mustache.

The blonde beside him shifted his weight, looking off to the side to avoid scars gaze. He seemed off, his breath was quick and he seemed uncomfortable where he stood.   
There was something about the newbie that made his skin crawl, though he didn’t know what it was.

“Hey who are you!” Keralis broke into his thoughts, he stared at the blonde, reaching out to take his hand.

“Um, I’m grian.” The man muttered, looking up and shook the energized mans hand.

“Hello grian! I’m Keralis, I like your face!” 

Scar looked over at grian who was taken aback by keralis’ bold approach, but the blonde smiled, letting out a breath of air he must have been holding.

This is weird

Scar had a bad feeling, something just seemed really off. The supposed dream felt too real, and the fact that Keralis also kept calling it a dream sent shivers up his spine. His gaze travelled around the town, the uncomfortable material on his shirt pulling on his neck.

The cool wind in his hair felt too real, and he didn’t think dream people would be able to think they were dreaming as well.

Pushing his suspicions to the back of his mind he put on a wide grin, reaching out to shake Grians hand.

“Hey friend, I’m Scar, good to meet you” he held grians gaze for a second, but the blue eyes revealed nothing.

“So” mumbo said, turning away from his chat with keralis, we need to get the others as I said”

“Yeah, we have to get the others before night falls.”  
Grian joined in, his hollow eyes glancing between the hermits.

“I can’t explain anything until we get everyone, but it’s going to take forever if we don’t split up” he continued. The blonde tapped a metal band on his wrist and the blue screen from earlier reappeared.

“This is the WOC, also known as the Watch Of Communication.” He explained.

“We can use it to send messages to everyone on the server so we can still communicate when we’re not together.”

The three hermits nodded, each tapping their own WOC to activate it. Mumbo seemed the most interested, poking it and fiddling with buttons to see what they did. Scar thought it seemed a bit too complicated for his likings so he left it alone for now.

“You also have an inventory of course, which you open by swiping your hand through the air, I know it’s weird, but that’s how it’s done” he continued, waving his hand through the air as he spoke to demonstrate, and sure enough, a bigger screen appeared in front of the blonde, looking almost identical to the one from the game. His inventory was empty except for an Enderchest.

“Wow you carry a lot don’t you” Scar chuckled, grinning at the shorter man.

Grian looked away, running his fingers through his long hair.   
“No, don’t have much of value” he muttered. 

“Anyways” he carried on, “just tap whatever you have in your inventory and it will appear.” 

He brought out his enderchest and sat it down on the ground. It let out a low hum and small purple particles were drifting from it. He stuck his hand in and pulled out something that must be the compasses. He handed one to each of the hermits. 

It wasn’t heavy, about the same weight as a phone. It didn’t seem special, the needle was spinning widely, but other than that it looked like a normal compass.

“How does it work?” Mumbo asked, staring at the thing, twisting to see if there was anything he could press. 

Grian brought out his own and held it out in front of them.

“There is two ways to use it” he explained, “you can tell it where you want to go, like a person or your bed, or you can bring up a map which shows the whole server and everyone in it. Pretty handy isn’t it?” 

Grian quickly showed them how you had to say a place or name to the compass to get it to point where you wanted, it was quite genius if he did say so himself. 

They fiddled with them for a minute, checking out where the other hermits currently were. Most seemed to be near their bases. Xisuma was hanging out at the edge of the shopping district, False, Tango and Impulses were at their bases which was also pretty close so those were the ones they decided on finding first.

“So, how did you get these? Is it the regular Minecraft compasses?” Mumbo asked after a moment of silence, raising a brow.

“No, these aren’t the regular ones” Grian responded, shoving the thing into his pocket.  
“Someone gave them to us years ago, and there is no way to craft new ones that I know of” he muttered.

Scar frowned, puzzled by the blondes answer. 

“Who gave them to you? And who are the others?” He asked, crossing his arms and shifting his weight, eyeing him with a suspicious glare.

Grian looked at the ground, grabbing at his sweater with trembling hands. Taking a deep breath he looked up at Scar, composing himself. 

“I can’t tell you yet, I can’t explain this more than once so we need to get the others” he said, his voice shaking.

Mumbo shot Scar a glance, silently telling him to not push it, he gave the mustached man a small nod.

“Okay, lets get going then” he responded, his face softening as he looked at the small man who gave him a grateful smile.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’m currently on my 16th day straight of working 10 hours a day so I’m pretty drained. That’s also the reason for this chapter taking so long since I’ve been dead every day lol. 
> 
> I go on holiday on Wednesday so I’ll be able to update this more often which I’m very exited for!
> 
> As always I hope you all enjoyed reading :D


	5. The first journey

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This has mentions of death and suicide spread out though the chapter, you will loose some of the backstory if you decide to skip it, but it wont necessary take much away from the main story

Reaching forward he grabbed the person in front of him by the collar, and in one quick motion diamond pierced flesh. The sound of bones crunching made him wince. He stood there for a moment, silence hung in the air like a stone. Tears mingled with sweat and his eyes snapped up, looking at the creature in front of him.

No

There was no creature, no Watcher, he gasped as his eyes connected with a familiar brown gaze. A small gasp escaped the other, his hand reaching up to grab the sword stuck in his chest, blood already welling out of the wound. 

“Grian?” Taurtis whispered, confusion clouding his vision as his legs buckled and he sunk down to the ground, groaning in pain as the sword shifted, digging further into his skin. 

Grians stared at the man. His face twisting in anguish as he realized what he had done. He fell down to his knees, holding a tight grip on Taurtis` shoulders, his gaze unwavering from the others eyes.

“You’re fine” he lied, tears falling from his cheeks.

“I didn’t mean- I didn’t know- please don’t leave me here alone” Grian cried, hugging Taurtis close and feeling the life slowly ebb away from the other man.

“Grian” the whisper came again, louder this time.

He buried his head in Taurtis’ hair, squeezing his eyes shut.   
As he sat there on the ground he heard footsteps moving towards him, and strong claws grabbed his arms. The Watcher’s cold breath filled the darkness as he was dragged away. Leaving his whole world behind him.

“Grian!” 

His eyes snapped open. A black haired man was holding his shoulders, waving one hand in front of his face and shaking his shoulders. 

“Jesus mate you compliantly zoned out, you had this terrible expression on your face and I got really worried” Mumbo said, furrowing his brows. 

“Oh” 

He stared at Mumbo, his shoulders dropping and his breath slowing as he looked into his eyes. 

Nobody had ever been there for him after a flashback. Not that anyone could’ve been since he had been alone ever since they had started.   
Seeing somebody caring for him felt.. weird? It didn’t sit right. Even seeing another person just felt so unreal at this point.

Rubbing his eyes he gave mumbo a wide smile.

“I’m alright, just thought about something, no big deal” he grinned. Mumbos eyes flashed with confusion, but he didn’t say anything, instead he waved his hand for Grian to follow him to where Scar and Keralis were looking at their maps.

“- so I’d say we all go over to Tango and then split up, going opposite directions around the ocean” Scar said as they walked over. Keralis was nodding in agreement, leaning over and staring at whatever Scar was looking at.

“You got a plan yet?” Grian smirked at the boys. 

they have no idea what they are in for. He thought, chuckling at the unprepared men.

Grian did feel bad for them, and he felt bad for the fact that he actually felt kinda good that there was someone there with him. He hadn’t talked to anyone in 3 months, and he hadn’t met a real person in 2 years so maybe he did deserve to feel a little bit good about something. 

“Yeah, as I was saying we should go north towards Tango`s base, then split up and go around. I think if we hurry we might be able to go all the way around before night falls.” Scar explained. Pointing towards where they could see some brightly colored buildings. 

“Alright, sounds good’’ he responded “we need more food though” Grian mentioned, already feeling the familiar sensation in his stomach. “Anywhere we can get some here?” Looking around he tried to spot a shop that could possibly sell food, they had called it a shopping district after all, so there had to be someone who thought of selling something to eat?

“Yeah” keralis said. “But I’ve got a full shulkerbox of golden carrots on me, we can just take some from that” waving his hand in front of him he opened his inventory and brought out a purple box. He put it on the ground and tapped it.

The top twisted as it opened, and as keralis had said it was filled with golden carrots.   
Grian made a face at them, he preferred meat as in here you could actually taste what you were eating, and anything golden just tasted like metal, and if you had spent as long in here as he had you’d know that steak or soup was the way to go.

Despite the fact that he didn’t like them he still grabbed a few stacks, as they did give back a lot of health and he didn’t exactly have any choice. 

He put them away in his inventory and grabbed one to chew on, feeling a sensation of warmth spread through his body as the carrots did their thing. 

After they each had filled their inventories with food, and Grian had gotten some tools from the others they set of north towards where they would find Tango. 

His brows furrowed as he wondered what they would all say when he told them about what he’d been through. He’d leave out some details of course. Didn’t have to tell them everything that had happened, but he didn't think everyone would take it well, as he did have experience with people going mad from hearing they were trapped in a game.

===============

The four men walked along the twisting paths in the shopping district towards Tangos base. The sun was steadily rising on the horizon, reminding them of how little time they really had. 

The days in Minecraft were usually only 10 minutes long, but fortunately for them time worked differently when you were in the game, where every minute turned into one hour so a day in the game would be 20 hours total for them. 10 hours of daylight and 10 hours of nighttime, which was pretty handy. Guess it would be kinda difficult to live if each day was only 10 minutes long. 

The nights were dangerous however, just as they are in the game. Zombies, skeletons and the dreaded creepers would be lurking in the darkness, waiting for someone to step out into the night and face the dangers awaiting. 

They hadn’t really gone out much at night in his old world, they knew that they could re-spawn in the game, but nobody dared to try it for real, in case they didn’t come back, which would’ve sucked.

That’s also the reason why he had tried to off himself earlier, because he truly thought that it would’ve been the end. It had clearly failed, as every other attempt had. Still, he wasn’t about to let anyone get attacked by ruthless monsters as you could actually feel pain in here, and he didn’t know for sure that they would come back, since he had appeared in another world. It wasn’t worth testing in case somebody died for real, or worse, ended up in an infinite loop as he had.

Grian admired the view from where he walked beside the hermits. He was somewhat of a builder himself and seeing the structures these people had made gave him new inspiration. Somewhere in the back of his mind his memories stirred from years ago of something similar. He had been watching the hermits back then, but this must be many seasons past where he had disappeared.

As they neared the destination for where they would split up he spotted multiple colorful buildings. The landscape around it was completely transformed, the bushes, ground and even trees were made from various colorful material, making the place look like it was taken straight out of a cartoon, which was probably the idea since he spotted a sign made in bold letters at the front that read “Toon Towers” with the “O`s” being big cartoony eyes with a curly mustache underneath.

When they got closer Grian explained to Scar and Keralis how to use the WOC to communicate, so if they got lost or ran into trouble they could contact him and he’d be able to help them somewhat at least.

With that he and Mumbo waved them goodbye and went on their way towards the next hermits base, leaving Keralis and Scar to find Tango and the others on the west side of the map, whereas he and Mumbo walked off to the east side.

It was a weird trip, Grian didn’t really know what to talk about since he hadn’t been with real people in so long, and Mumbo was rather awkward, often stumbling over his words and rambling on and on about some weird redstone contraption he’d been working on. He had a certain charm to him though, and Grian decided he rather liked the taller man, it was nice to have someone to listen to for a change.

Scratch that, just walking with someone else was a nice change. Hearing the soft grass getting trampled by someone else’s feet, and listening to the others breath as they walked up hills and through forests made warmth spread through his body. 

“-so as you can tell it wasn’t exactly easy” Mumbo chuckled, scratching the back of his neck as he walked. he’d been talking about some weird redstone thing again that Grian didn't quite understand. 

“yeah i get it” he responded, shooting Mumbo a confident grin. 

Mumbo laughed, knowing full well that Grian had no idea what he was talking about.

``didn't you do any redstone before you got here?`` Mumbo said, looking down at him. 

``no I was more of a builder`` he explained, grinning as mumbo gave him a crooked smile.   
Grian sighed, shoving his hands into his pockets. Painful memories filled his mind as he once again was reminded of the past. He thought about Mumbo and how weird it was for Hermitcraft to still be going on. 

“what season are you at anyways? I never thought that series would be going on for so many years.” he asked. Mumbo stared ahead smiling as he recalled the last few years.   
“We're at season seven currently, its been great, working on projects with the others.. you okay?”

Grian had stopped, a confused expression on his face. Mumbo stepped back, his brows furrowing at the blondes reaction.

“what- what do you mean you’re at season 7? You must be at season nine or ten at least. It’s been 5 years??” grian stuttered, looking up at Mumbo, hopelessness shining in his eyes. 

“I got here February 2020, its got to be 2025 now, right??” Grian asked, his voice rising as his mind tried to process what he’d just been told. 

Mumbo looked at him with a worried expression.

“mate it’s July 2020” he said in a small voice, slowly walking towards Grian and putting his hand on the others shoulder. 

“then its only been 5 months” Grian looked down, his eyes wide. “but I swear it’s been years!” he cried, snapping his head up again to look at the dark haired man. 

“Mumbo am I crazy??” Grians voice shook, his lip trembling as tears started to fall from his soft blue eyes. 

Mumbo silently wrapped his arms around the other, squeezing his shoulders in an embrace. 

The world fell quiet around them, the only sound being Grians soft sobbing as he let out emotions that had been bottled up over the years. 

They stood there for a while, Mumbo stroked Grians back with reassurance. Tears soaking the soft material on his suit.

“I don’t think you’re crazy, Grian” he whispered, as he held the blonde in his arms.   
“Time probably works differently in here, I believe you” he said softly, running his hand through the others choppy blond hair.

His breath slowed slowed at Mumbos reassuring words, hugging him tight.

And for the first time in years.

Grian felt safe.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’m finally home after 18 days of work! It’s been rough, and I might’ve spent the last three. Days laying in bed just relaxing lol.
> 
> But once again i hope you enjoyed! Your comments make me so incredibly happy so if you liked it please consider leaving a lil comment for me to read ^^
> 
> Also my instagram is quinnthekid_ if you want to check it out, there is not a whole lot there yet, but i plan on making some art for this au so yeahh that’s cool.
> 
> Anyways thanks for reading and ill see you all in the next chapter!


	6. What happened to you?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hello! I’ve been busy with art(check it out at quinnthekid_ on Instagram ;)) so this took a bit longer than expected, but it’s also quite a bit longer so I hope that makes up for it!

“TANGO!” Keralis yelled. 

They had been walking around on the ground for a few minutes, trying to spot the blonde with no luck.

“WHERE ARE YOU!” Scar joined in, cupping his hands around his mouth to create more sound. 

“Man were stuck on the first one, what do we do if we cant find him?” Keralis huffed, wiping sweat of his forehead. 

Scar thought for a moment, his gaze traveling around the area. 

“It says that he’s here on the map though, so where is he?” 

As they stood there wondering about this dilemma a shout came from above. 

“Hello?” 

They both looked up, and on top of a purple building stood a man in a red shirt, his bright blond hair glowed in the sun.

“Um, a little help?” The blonde said, looking down over the edge of the roof. Even from here he could see Tangos striking red eyes as he looked around for a way down. 

“Are you stuck?” Keralis called up, grinning at his friend. 

“Yeah, sort of” Tango chuckled, scratching the back of his head. 

“Well,” Scar started, “you are wearing your elytra, could you glide down with that?” He asked. 

Tango looked back at his wings uncertainly. 

“I mean I could try, but I might fall to my death” he laughed nervously, talking a step back preparing to jump off the roof. 

Keralis shut his eyes, squeezing Scars arm in worry as they both watched the blonde take a running start and jump of the roof. 

He fell for a few moments, waving his hands widely, before his elytra spread and he slowly glided through the sky. 

“This is amazing!” Tango yelled, spreading out his arms as he soared above them, the wind blowing through his hair. 

As he neared the ground he braced his legs for impact. He ran a few steps before coming to a halt in front of Keralis and Scar. 

“That looked so cool!” Keralis piped, his eyes wide as he looked at Tango, who was beaming with pride.

“It felt amazing!” He replied, his hair resembling a birds nest after his flight through the skies. 

“Well glad you liked it, but we need to get going, you see we are trying to find all the hermits” Scar informed his red eyed friend. “Something big has happened, we’ll explain later, but right now you need to come with us.” He explained. Tango gave him a confused stare, but nodded in agreement. 

“Hmm” Keralis thought for a moment before they could walk off, “It would be faster to fly, why didn’t we think of elytras earlier?”

Tango raised a brow at them, wondering the same thing. 

“I mean yeah it would be fast” Scar shrugged. “But what if we fall?”

Tango laughed at that, his red eyes flicking between Keralis and Scar “you didn’t worry about that when you asked me to jump off the roof!” He pointed out, making Scars face light up in embarrassment.

“Sorry, it was the easiest way to get you down” 

Tango had a point, he hadn’t thought of him falling when he suggested to jump off the roof, but it still made his belly crawl to think of flying through the air. It was just so different, he was usually in a wheelchair all the time with limited range of movement. Just walking was strange to him, and flying was on a whole other level. 

Despite his worries he walked up on a small hill and lined up at the top with the others. After figuring out the direction they needed to go and equipping their wings they took a stance, bracing themselves before running towards the edge. 

Scar shut his eyes as he leapt off the cliff, a small whine escaped his lips. The air flowed around his body and before he could start falling he fired a rocket, propelling himself up into the air and leaving a trail of smoke after him. 

Air pressed around his body and his hair whipped his face. Slowly blinking his eyes open he gasped. The ground was so far below him! 

To his left keralis was wearing a wide grin, his hands spread out in front of him like Superman as he soared through the sky. Looking to his right he spotted Tango flying left and right, quickly getting the hang of his wings before diving towards the water and right before hitting the surface he pulled up, yelling in glee.

Scar and keralis followed and the three flew close by the water, all beaming as they flew through the air at high speeds.

“Hey!” Scar shouted, “maybe we should’ve reminded Mumbo and Grian about this then they could get around fast too” he grinned at the others. Who nodded in agreement. 

=================

When the hermits landed at their next destination they quickly located Zedaph, who was wandering around his base looking understandably confused. After a happy reunion they sent a short message to Mumbo and Grian saying;

“Hello friends! We figured out the elytra and it’s making our trip significantly shorter, you might was to get your little asses in the air as well! See you at the island!”

On the other end of the receiver Mumbo, Grian and False, who had just joined their party, stared uncertainty at the message. Mumbo knew on one hand that yes, it would make their trip shorter, but also he didn’t fancy falling to his death. 

False however seemed exited and was already pulling on her elytra. She’d always seemed eager to do daring things, always first in line to be trying out new gadgets. They had found her between hers and Tangos base, already exploring and trying to find the others. 

Grian looked pretty unsure as well, he was trying to hide it, but Mumbo could see that his hands were shaking. Mumbo was actually surprised at grians reaction, if he’d been in the game for so long then wouldn’t he have encountered an elytra before? 

Despite their fears, they managed to get in the air, quickly making their way around the ocean. Grian was amazed by how the hermits had transformed the world, the work they had done outshone anything they had managed to do in his old world. 

And he’d never flown with an elytra either, at first he’d been worried about falling, but he quickly fell in love with his wings. He felt so free, gliding through the air at high speeds. 

===============

It took about half the day to find everybody, some had wandered off and some had even gotten into the nether *cough* wels *cough.

After getting everyone and meeting back up in the shopping district they set up a big table for everyone to sit. By now most of them had figured something strange was happening though no one suspected the truth.

Grian looked at them, feeling rather left out where he stood at the head of the table. The hermits were busy talking with each other and how cool it was to meet. Even Mumbo, who Grian had taken a liking too and also the only one that knew anything about him had left him for his friends and was currently chatting with a man named Iskall. 

He sat down on a newly built chair and leant back, feeling the muscles in his back loosen as he sank into the chair.  
He watched the other hermits walk around each other gleefully. He hadn’t talked to all of them, but so far most seemed pretty outgoing, with bdubs and Iskall at the top of that list. He rather liked the Swede, he was very nice, funny, and with the most contagious laugh Grian had ever heard. 

Xisuma, however you pronounced that, seemed the most calm. Grian didn’t remember much from real life, but he thought the guy might be the admin of the server which in theory should give him access to commands which might help them get out?

Sitting up straight he cleared his throat, trying to get the others attention, most had taken a seat at this point. As the last few took their seat he rested his hands on the table and let his gaze sweep over the crowd. It was strange to see so many people after so much time, but it felt good to not be alone for once. 

“So,” he began, his voice breaking at the word. After clearing his throat yet again he started over. Silencing the crowd as he got their attention. Each turning a curious gaze towards him.

“So, you probably have a lot of questions.” He stared at the hermits, his belly crawling with unease, looking to his right he spotted Mumbo, who shot him a warm smile of encouragement. 

“I don’t have all the answers.” He stated more confidently. “But I will tell you what I do know.”

“And do not interrupt me before I’m finished.” He glared at them, some taken aback by his sudden cold tone, but they all nodded in agreement. A guy named Rendog mimicked zipping his lips.

“First of all, this is not a dream.” He said seriously. A few gasps came from the crowd, some rolled their eyes. 

“About 5 years ago I was transported into this game along with 11 other players. Just like you we had no idea what was going on or how we got there. All we knew was that we had to survive.” 

He paused, looking at the shocked faces in front of him. Some still looked at him like he was lying, which was understandable.

“We started playing normally, gathering things and making progress. We made a community hall where most of us slept every night.” He smiled fondly at the memories. Before he could continue a man with green skin and shiny metallic body parts stood up.

“I said no interruptions.” Grian frowned.

“This is nonsense” the green dude stated, looking at the other hermits. 

“Do you really believe this crap, we’re obviously dreaming.” He continued, his voice firm as he glared at Grian.

The hermits looked around at each other, some unsure and some clearly taking the mans side.

“I know this is hard to believe-“ Grian tried to say, but was shut down when green-dude slammed his hand into the table. His eyes revealed both anger and fear and his hands were trembling. 

“This is crazy, this isn’t real” he shouted across the table raising a hand to point a grian.   
“You’re insane!”

Grian sighed, he had known this could happen. He hadn’t really reacted well when he’d first gotten in either.

From the other side of the table Bdubs stood up, looking green-dude in the eyes he said.  
“Doc, this is no time to argue. Let’s hear what he has to say at least” shooting a glance at Grian he continued.

“Look at the guy, he’s clearly been through a lot.” 

Docs gaze flickered between Grian and Bdubs, denial still written all over his face. He hesitated, but finally sat down, fixing Grian with a glare.

Shifting in his seat Grian resumed his story.

“As I was saying. We had no idea what had happened to us. What we did know was that all of us regularly played Minecraft and we knew we had to try and survive.

It was very hard to believe that it was real, and some of us never did. Some thought they were in a coma, some thought they were dead and this was the afterlife. 

I don’t know what I believe, I just know I’ve been here for so long and if this truly is the afterlife I’m probably in Hell.” A few snickers escaped the hermits. Others were looking at him with serious eyes.

“We called our world ‘Evolution’ or Evo for short. 

In the beginning it was all about surviving, we built a base for all of us to live in. We went mining for resources to get the best armor to protect ourselves. We never went outside at night, too scared someone would die-“ before he could finish the sentence he was interrupted again, this time by a red haired girl with turquoise zombie like skin, he thought her name might be Cleo or something. 

“But don’t you re-spawn?” She asked, confusion clear on her face, sounds of agreement came from around the table. 

Sighing he sat back in his seat, clearly he wouldn’t be able to tell his story without interruptions.

“We thought of that.” He said, “but would you really risk someone actually dying? If you had the smallest suspicion that this might be real? Would you really take the chance?” 

Cleo sat back, her eyes widening as she looked at her friends. She gave a little shake of her head. 

Of course she wouldn’t.

“We never dared to test it. Even if it would work it wouldn’t be worth it.” He continued. 

“In the beginning we tried every way we could think of to get out, in the end we figured we would have to beat the game to get out. So we started preparing. Spending months prepping for the ultimate battle. 

Of course there were a lot of us, normally 12 players would be more than enough to beat The End, but we couldn’t afford casualties.

Everything we did was done with caution, just getting the blaze rods took us ages.” 

He paused for a moment, thinking back to his missions. They had sent out teams of three and he usually went out with Pearl and Taurtis. They had been a great team, always having fun despite the circumstances. 

He rubbed his face before continuing. 

“After a while we sort of forgot about the end of the game I guess. Months went by where we didn’t make any progress. I guess we got used to it.

We built a whole society there. We had different groups like, redstoners, builders, miners, stuff like that. I was a builder and a grinder, so I would grind for resources and build the buildings in our town. 

It was a great way to divide up the group, I mean a builder who had no redstone experience wouldn’t be able to do any technical stuff anyway so it just made sense. 

But yeah as I said we forgot about the end for a really long time, until one day when one of our scouters, scouters would travel far distances and locate new areas for resources or new places to build in, tripped into a ravine where he found the stronghold. 

After that we pulled the stick out of our ass and got to work, pulling out old chests with our gear and after 3 full years of living in Minecraft we finally set out to kill the dragon. 

I won’t lie and say I wasn’t scared to death. I mean on one hand it was great to finally be getting somewhere again, but then again I guess it was kinda nice living there. We had been there for so long that it would be weird to leave you know?” 

Grian paused for a moment, looking at the hermits taking in what they’d just been told. He could practically see the gears turning in their head as they tried to process the story. He chuckled at their pitiful faces, they had no idea that his story was just getting started. After taking a deep breath he continued.

“When we finally got there we all sat outside the portal for a minute, just thinking about the battle we were about to go through. 

It was insane man, we knew some of us could possibly die and it was just so hard to take in, but we swallowed our fears and jumped into the portal.

Of course we planned it out carefully, we trained for months, some were able to hit a flying object 50 blocks away so in theory it should’ve been easy.”

Tears stung behind his eyes as memories flooded his brain. Beside him Mumbo put his hand on his shoulder, squeezing tight to reassure him.

“It went horribly wrong. The fight itself was easy, but as I raised my sword to go for the final swing they came.” He sallowed hard, his hands were shaking and the others looked at him with worried expressions.

“Who are ‘they’?” Xisuma asked, his voice distorted beneath his mask. Grian looked at him, his mouth twisting into a frown as tears forced themselves out of his eyes. 

“They called themselves The Watchers.” He answered with a shuddering breath.

“They are huge creatures with large purple robes. A mask covers half their face and bless your soul to anyone that gets to see what lays underneath.

They are merciless, they don’t care about anything or anyone. They toy with the life of innocent people.” He spat, fury boiling his blood as he thought of his captures. 

“They said we had done well, and then when we thought we were safe they turned around and killed all of my friends.” By now he was full on sobbing, he buried his face in his hands. His whole body was shaking as the memories flickered through his mind.

================

Xisuma stared at grian with a worried expression. Even though he didn’t know the man he felt deeply sorry for him, loosing so much must have been terrible.

The story he had told was awful and pity flooded his eyes as he watched Grian hug his trembling body. Mumbo had shifted in his seat and had put his arm over grians shoulder, slowly rubbing his arm. 

It felt awkward, sitting there watching the scene that was unfolding. 

When Keralis and Scar first had come and gotten him he’d been in his base, wandering around trying to find somebody. He had thought it was a dream of course, but he quickly suspected something was up after meeting the others. 

He hadn’t taken his helmet of yet, though he had gotten a peak through his visor in one of the windows they had walked by. From what he could tell he had fluffy brown hair, and scars were drawn across his face. Other than that he seemed pretty normal, his body looked the same, and as he watched the others he could tell they were mostly the same build and height as he’d seen on pictures, but their appearance was changed to look like their Minecraft skins. 

A few of them were a pretty awful sight to look at. Doc for example with his spotty green skin and metal parts, and Cleo with her zombie skin looked pretty weird.   
Tangos red eyes looked like they could pierce his soul if he stared too long, though his cheery body language made up for it. Oh and Mumbos mustache was definitely something.

He guessed he looked pretty weird as well, sporting his big helmet and suit. Beside him were Rendog, who was rubbing his teary eyes. 

After a moment Grian took a deep breath, wiped his face on his dirty sweater and sat up straight.

“Sorry about that” his voice was still shaky. “The watchers are kind of like creative players. They have access to commands and stuff. They can basically do whatever they want.

They live in a dimension similar to the end in these giant black towers. I don’t know what they are or who they are, but I do know that they are terrible beings.” 

Grians eyes had gone dark, his body stiff as he talked about these ‘watchers’ 

Xisuma didn’t know what to think of them, but they had obviously done something awful for grian to talk about them in this way. 

“After they killed my friends” he continued, “they took me with them. I don’t know why, but for almost 2 years I lived with them.

Of course I wanted to leave, I tried many times, but finally 6 months ago I managed to escape. I appeared in a new world, and I though as we had done before maybe if I beat the game I could get out. So I did. 

But nothing happened. 

I appeared in a new world. So I beat it again.

And again, and again.

Over and over for 3 months.  
In the end I got sick of running I guess and settled down. I built a small town for myself, but after a while that got boring as well and I thought, well, I have nothing left to loose.” 

Xisumas eyes widened as he realized what Grian was about to say.

“So I jumped of my roof and tried to end my life as a last attempt to get out. And I ended up here.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all so much for reading! And the fact that we’re currently over 1k hits and 100kudos?? That’s amazing! Love you all so much!❤️ 
> 
> Hope you enjoyed this as much as the others and I’ll see you next time!


	7. Disappointed

Ren blinks slowly, taking in the story he’s just been told. A lot of crazy things had happened in his life, but this was on another level of crazy. The others around him looked just as shocked as he felt. The world seemed to be spinning and his vision went fuzzy as his mind tried to process what he’d just been told.  
He could hear Doc standing up and shout at Grian again, not believing a word he’d just been told.  
Ren couldn’t blame him, he felt just as much disbelief and denial as Doc must be feeling, it wasn’t exactly normal to find yourself stuck in a game.

He’d just woken up and barely sat down on his computer when he’d been transported in, at first he thought it was a dream of course, what else would it be? Either way he’d gladly followed the others, enjoying spending time with his friends, but it had been a long day and he could feel his body growing tired where he sat. His eyelids started to droop and he sank further down into his chair, his face splitting open in a big yawn and he hoped they could get some rest soon.

Xisuma was sighing beside him, his head was resting on his hands. Ren couldn’t see his face very well through the helmet, but he could tell he was thinking about something serious.

Clearing his throat Xisuma spoke, “so what do we do now? What have you tried?” 

“Pretty much everything” Grian said, “I mean I told you I tried beating the game, and.. you know, anyways” he shook his head, banishing the bad thoughts.  
I also tried using ‘magic’ when I was with the watchers” he said, looking away from the others. 

“Magic?” Cub asked, his brows furrowing. 

Red heat spread up Grians face, he rubbed the back of his neck and pulled his hair behind his ears. “Yeah, they called it magic at least. I said they were sorta like creative players, magic was one of the perks of being them.” 

Ren frowned, “so this is like next level Minecraft then?” he asked, “with new stuff like fancy compasses and magic?”

“I guess you could call it that,” grian nodded. “But yeah as I said I don’t really have any ideas at the moment unfortunately”

“What are we going to do then?” Doc asked, his normal eye was wet with tears he was trying to hold back. “Are we stuck here forever?” Bdubs had stood up as well, and sent Doc a reassuring smile. 

Ren could tell Bdubs was scared as well, but he must be trying to stay positive for the others sake, and for Doc who seemed to be struggling the most. Ren felt sorry for him, of course he was scared too, he didn’t know what was going on either, and if they were ever going to get out, but he managed to keep his cool. He thought there was no reason to freak out, that would just make the situation worse. 

“It’ll be alright doc, we’ll figure something out” Bdubs soothed, having moved around the table to the taller mans side. “For now lets just take it one step at a time yeah?”  
His gaze drifted over the hermits.  
“We should probably set up a temporary base right?” He suggested, sounds of agreement came from around the table.

“yeah man I’m about to fall asleep here!” Ren chuckled, rubbing his face and sitting up straight, a few of the other hermits yawned as they stood up to find a suitable spot for a small base. 

============

They ended up placing beds throughout the building they were in, thinking it was good enough for one night at least and then they could see if they could do something else the next day. 

outside they set up a couple of campfires and chairs so people could talk and eat before slowly heading of to sleep.

Grian looked at them, he felt weird at the sight of so many people, though it was nice to have someone to talk to again.  
So far he thought the hermits were alright, he hadn’t talked to all of them yet, but they seemed nice. Doc was a bit aggressive he thought, but he was probably just scared and Grian couldn't blame him. He’d been just as scared when he’d gotten in and he’d been pretty aggressive as well. It was a difficult thing to get used to, but in Evo they had an advantage. They thought they had a chance to get out, and they had hope that it was all fake. 

Now he knew it was real. There was no way he’d lived 5 years of his life in here with it being fake. Though it was probably a bit less than 5 years since the days were only 20 hours long, but it didn’t really matter at this point.

Behind the building the sun had already set and the island was lit up by countless torches and lanterns.  
Some of the lanterns were even blue, which he found strange, but it was apparently from a new update in the nether. He did think they were really cool, and there was even blue torches, campfires and lanterns! It was nice to get some new blocks to use as he was pretty bored with what they had previously.

Grian walked towards the back of the building and sat down on the ground leaning up against the back wall. He closed his eyes and let out a sigh, feeling the soft grass between his fingers. He liked nights like these, the familiar chill swept across the land, ruffling his hair.

He wondered what it would be like to get out, if they ever did that is.  
It would be so different from here. There was no economy to worry about, no society, no money or work. Also, his age would be different, he’d spent five years in the game, but it had only been 5 months in real life so technically he had lived for 34 years, but he was still 27 based on his birthday.

As he sat there thinking he heard footsteps, and Xisuma slid down beside him.

“It’s strange isn’t it, seeing this for real.” X asked, his distorted voice made Grian cringe, it sounded weirdly similar to the watchers. 

“Yeah, I never thought I’d see anything familiar ever again” he sighed.

Xisuma let out a heavy breath

“Do you have any plans for what we should do now? Do we just survive or do we try to figure something out?” He asked grian.

He frowned, turning over his brain to try to come up with a plan. An idea from earlier popped into his mind, it was crazy, but it just might work.

“You’re the admin aren’t you?” He asked, cocking his head.

Xisumas mouth twisted into in a smile, clearly thinking the same as Grian. 

“You think I could use commands?” He said, raising his wrist to look at the woc.

“Yeah, I mean I haven’t tried before , but technically it should be possible?” Grian thought for a second, trying to think of something that could help them.

“Maybe we should start small, like changing the weather? He said finally.  
Xisuma nodded, and quickly typed the command into the little machine at his wrist. 

“Here goes nothing” he shrugged, before pressing the send button.

For a moment nothing happened, then rain started to pour from the sky.

Grians eyes widened, standing up he spread his arms and yelled with glee.  
“This is it!! We can do this!!” He looked at Xisuma, who had stood up as well. His face lighting up in happiness. 

“Do creative mode next!” Grian said excitedly, pushing his now soaked hair behind his ears.

Xisuma did as grian said, typing in the new command and the two stared expectantly at each other. 

“Do you feel.. different?” Grian asked after a moment when nothing happened. 

“Not really” X frowned.

“Try opening your inventory” Grian responded, thinking it might’ve changed.  
X did, but it just looked like a standard survival.

“Huh, weird, guess we can’t do that then” Grian said disappointingly.

“It was worth a shot I guess” Xisuma shrugged.  
Grian leant against the wall and sank back down to the ground, his wet clothes plastered uncomfortably against his skin. Resting his hands on his knees he let out a heavy sigh.

“I almost had hope there” he said looking back up at Xisuma, who was sitting down beside him again.

“It’ll be fine, we’ll figure something out.” X reassured him, his distorted voice firm.

As they sat there in silence, just looking out at the ocean Mumbo turned the corner. His slicked back hair was hanging into his face and water was streaming down his face. Despite being soaked a wide grin was plastered on his face.

“Hey, you guys having fun?” Mumbo said, wiping water from his eyes and pulled his hair back in an attempt to see something through the pouring rain. Grian laughed, the raven haired man was something special he thought.

“Yeah” he responded, “actually I was just about to head on to bed as I’m pretty worn out.” Pulling himself up he squeezed water from his sweater which was hanging awkwardly off his shoulder. He frowned, his sweater was like a part of him, but over the years it had become tattered and worn with stitches and holes. 

Beside him Xisuma stood up as well, and the three headed off to the temporary camp site. 

The hermits had placed multiple campfires and a few of them were sitting around drying up their clothes. Grian walked up to the nearest one and pulled off his sweater, revealing a white tank top underneath. He hung up his sweater to dry and stood by the fire for a few minutes to warm up the rest of his body. 

After he was dry he went off to find a bed and laid down under the covers, his breath slowing down as he relaxed. The sound of the other hermits sleeping comforted him as he drifted off to sleep.

============

He opened his eyes in a dark room, dark purple robes hung over his shoulders, heavy wings stuck out on his back and a pale mask covered his face.  
Grian drew a sharp breath, raising his hands to take of the mask. As his fingers brushed over the symbol carved at the front a cold voice spoke from behind him.

“Hello” the voice said. Shivers crawled up his back as he recognized the voice that has spoken. He turned slowly, his wings spreading defensively. In the shadows stood a tall creature, no, a Watcher, its wings even bigger than his own, and it was several heads taller than him. It was wearing the same mask Grian had on, two points sticking down from either side like fangs. 

Grian kept quiet as the watcher continued, “we’ve been looking for you” it said. Bitterness tainting it’s voice. “You didn’t think you could get away that easily did you darling?”  
Grians body shook as the words. He knew they would eventually find him, but he didn’t think it would happen this soon.

His body stiffened as it came closer, the air turning cold as the Watcher neared him. It reached out with its claws, grabbing his face. Tears stung behind his eyes and he forced his trembling legs to go still.

The Watcher smiled, seemingly pleased to see he was afraid.  
“Don’t you miss us dear? We treated you well didn’t we? Gave you everything you could ever need?” It’s face spread open in a wide grin, revealing sharp and pointy teeth. 

The Watcher let go, disappointed at his silence. “You are no fun anymore” it said, “you can try to convince them that you’re innocent, but we know what you did, and what you became.”

Grian flinched, he knew if the hermits found out what he had done they would hate him, call him a liar, traitor. He’d told himself it wasn’t his fault, that there was nothing he could’ve done, but they would say there is always something you can do. 

“They don’t need to know” he croaked, his voice hollow as he looked up at the watcher.  
It’s grin spread even wider at the sound of his voice. 

“Thought you’d lost your tongue there darling! But sorry to disappoint” it paused, Grians gaze rested on the watcher as he waited for it to speak.

The room went dark, and before he could react the watchers face was inches from his, it’s eyes glowing white.

“They will find out”

“Cause we’re coming”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello! I’m back at work again so sorry this took so long, but I’m very exhausted lol.  
> Anyways the watchers have arrived! (Or they are arriving, but you know)  
> I love them honestly, can’t wait to write more about them! 
> 
> Anyways I’ll stop rambling now, hope you enjoyed the chapter! And I hope your enjoying the story so far! 
> 
> Oh! And I would do anything for soft doc💕💕


	8. Him?

Darkness surrounded the building where the unsuspecting hermits slept. The moon hung high in the sky casting a silver glow over the district. 

The night was quiet, not a single leaf ruffled by the wind. 

Inside the big sand colored building a blonde man was sleeping restlessly as his mind was tortured with bad dreams as memories of the past was brought into the light.

Grian woke in a cold sweat, his eyes wide and his breath fast and ragged. For a moment he didn’t know where he was, looking around widely trying to jog his brain. 

Right

The memories from the day before came flooding back, how he’d appeared in a new world and how that world was somehow occupied.

He closed his eyes and took a few deep breaths, forcing his body to calm down and his breathing to slow. The rain from earlier had stopped, the only sound being the steady breath from the other hermits and his own heart which was beating hard against his chest.

Looking around his eyes fixed on the newbies, his lips curved into a pitiful smile as he thought about their shocked faces from when he’d told them where they were, and he wouldn’t be surprised if some of them still thought it was fake. 

Actually, it would be rather weird if none of them thought it was fake.

As he sat there his dream came back to him. The familiar face of the Watcher glaring at him from behind its mask and the freezing air that always seemed to follow them sending shivers up his spine. The dark walls of the castle looming above his short frame.

He shook his head, knowing that the dream shouldn’t be taken lightly. He knew the threat was real, and he knew they were all in danger. Pity filled his mind as he looked at the hermits. He didn’t want anyone to get hurt, but he knew the watchers didn’t care about anything. They would kill, torture and hurt anyone just so they could get what they wanted. 

Which was him, unfortunately.

A part of him wanted to just give in. Go back to them and protect the hermits, maybe the watchers would send them home. Though he knew it wasn’t that easy, and he deserved to be happy too didn’t he?

Sighing he laid down, letting his arms hang out on either side of the bed. The chill of the night creeping under his duvet and cooling down his body.

The truth was he didn’t know what to do. He couldn’t go back, but he also couldn’t let the hermits get hurt. He couldn’t let anyone know about his past, and he had to figure out a way to fix Xisuma and get out of this stupid game. It seemed impossible, he had tried everything to get out, and not even X’s admin powers could do anything of worth.

As he laid there thinking a scream came from a bed a few meters away from his own and the person laying there sat up straight. 

His head snapped in the direction of the sound, squinting he tried to make out who it was in the dark. 

After a moment he could tell it was Xisuma, who has breathing loudly, his whole body trembling. Grian quickly got up and ran over to the mans side, gently approaching to not scare him further. As he came closer Xisuma’s head turned to look at him and Grian gasped in horror. 

X had taken of his helmet as he slept, his brown hair sticking out in every direction. Grian noticed he had freckles dusting his nose and cheeks, as well as scars running across his face. 

But his gasp wasn’t caused by seeing the hermits face, rather his eyes. Xisumas soft brown eyes had turned pure white, a subtle glow lighting up the room as he stared at Grian. 

“Hello?” Xisuma whispered, reaching out his arms and grasping at the air. Grians brows furrowed in confusion, but he carefully reached out to grab the mans desperate hands. 

“Hey it’s okay, it’s me, Grian.” He said softly, sitting down on the bed beside X and stroked his back to calm him down. 

Shuffling sounded throughout the room, and several Hermits were sitting in their beds, rubbing sleep out of their eyes.

“What was that?” One of them said,

“I have no idea” another answered. 

Then, fast steps could be heard echoing through the halls. 

“Sheswamy!” Keralis yelled, his gaze horrified as he ran towards his friend. When he reached the bed he fell to his knees, cupping X’s face in his hands carefully, leaning in close to study his eyes.   
X was shaking badly, tears streaming down his face. 

“I can’t see” he whispered. 

The room went silent for a moment. Pitiful and shocked gazes were staring at the bed where the three sat. 

Keralis stared into X’s unseeing eyes, his face painted with shock as he digested the words. 

“Keralis?” X said again, his hands reaching out to feel something. 

“I’m here sheswam” he whispered back. 

“You can’t see anything at all?”

X shook his head. 

Anger filled keralis’ usually kind and gentle mind. Clenching his jaw his head turned to look at Grian.

“Did you do this” he asked, his voice cold.

“Of course not!” Grian shot back defensively, though a thought crossed his mind. 

“Well- I’m not sure, we tried using commands last night, and I had this dream..” he trailed off, lost in thoughts.

From behind him a low growl escaped Doc’s lips. 

“So not only have you brought us to this terrible place, but now you’re hurting us as well?” He asked, anger bubbling under his skin.

Grian looked over at him and spotted several others who were clearly thinking the same thing. 

“of course not, I had no idea this would happen, and I’m not even sure that’s what caused it.” He pleaded desperately. His hands falling to his sides in defeat.

It was true, he didn’t think that was what caused it. His brows furrowed as he thought about the events that had been going on.

“I think maybe it’s the watchers” he said in a small voice, eyes darting around looking for reassurance. 

Doc scowled at him, his mouth twisting into a frown.

“So now these so called Watchers have come to kill us too?” He growled, red flashing behind his eyes. He clenched his hands which were slightly trembling. 

Grian stared at him helplessly, hearing his worst fear be spoken made his eyes burn with tears which pressed at the back of his eyes.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to- I never wanted this to happen.” Grian tried to say, but as the last word escaped his lips cold metal connected with the soft skin on his cheek and he was thrown backwards.

Shock pulsed through his body as he sat up, reaching up to touch his face. Above him doc was being held back by False and Scar, he was fuming, breathing heavily and trying to rip his arms free from the strong grips of the hermits.

“Let me go!” Doc yelled as he was being dragged backwards.

“Dude calm down, it’s not his fault” False soothed, her strong arms keeping doc in a firm grip.

Grian stared at Doc in fear and shock. He knew they could have strong reactions, but he didn’t think anyone would hit him. 

Slowly he got to his feet, his cheek stinging and already starting to swell from the hard blow. Despite the pain he walked off towards the door without a word, leaving the hermits with Doc and Xisuma. 

There was no point in trying to make them understand, he realized. They would have to figure it out just like they had done in Evo. 

“Hey Grian! Wait!” He could hear Mumbo yelling behind him. 

“I’m sorry about that, it’s just a lot to take in and I bet Doc didn’t really mean to hit you, he’s just upset that’s all.” 

Grian turned and looked up at the mustached man, his hair was ruffled and his shirt was wrinkled. He’d ditched the jacket and tie, and somehow his shirt was stained with redstone. 

Mumbo stopped in front of him, uncertainty flashing in his eyes. Grian stared at him, a sad smile on his face.

“I understand how hard it can be okay? And I guess it’s going to take a while for all of them to accept that this is their new reality.”

He sighed and shoved his hands in his pockets, feeling the broken plastic piece that he’d kept for so long. Old memories filled his mind, memories where he was happy and safe. Together with friends who understood. 

“I’m sorry about Xisuma” he whispered, shutting his eyes tight. “I really didn’t know that it could go so wrong, I just thought maybe-“ his voice broke, tears stinging his eyes. 

Mumbo’s voice softened, “it’s okay, we’ll figure something out” he reassured him. 

Grian smiled as Mumbo stretched out his arms to give him a hug, and once again he buried his head in the taller mans chest. 

“I hope so”

“I really do”

=============

Doc stared at his hands. One made of metal and one was spotted with different shades of green. Clenching his fists he looked up, blinking tears out of his eyes, or rather, eye. 

When he’d first arrived he had been scared, confused, and most of all he was terrified of his own reflection. He’d noticed pretty quickly that they all had their Minecraft skins, and his was a mix between human, creeper and cyborg which had left him looking extremely weird.

Not only did he look awful, but his sight was all weird because of his cyborg eye, and his metal arm was numb. It would probably take a bit of time to get used to controlling as he didn’t know the strength of his hand so he’d accidentally broken a few things already.

Ever since he’d first seen what he looked like he’d avoided anything that could show his reflection so that he didn’t have to look at himself, and he could tell the other hermits avoided looking at him as well. Rather looking at each other than at him, not that he could blame them for it. 

He was wearing tattered gray jeans as well as a white lab coat, his ‘regular’ eye was completely black except for a white dot where his pupil should’ve been. His other eye was surrounded by gray metal and covered with red glass. His whole right arm was made of metal. It was way more complicated that anything he’d ever seen. 

He lifted up his arm and studied it, moving his fingers and watching as the machine worked. It made almost no sound, just a low clinking as the metal touched. 

Even though it scared him it was interesting to see something like that do it’s thing, and how it responded just like a normal arm would. He wondered if he could modify it in the future, if he could figure out how it worked that is. 

Letting his hand drop he thought about the events that had been occurring. So much had happened in the last day and he didn’t know what to believe. this ‘Grian’ person seemed just as lost as any of them and doc found it hard to think any of what he said was true.

A small part of him still hoped that it was all just a terrible dream, but as he sat there on the grass outside of the mayor building he started to think that maybe it was in fact real. 

He’d never experienced a dream like this anyway.

Doc thought about what had happened to Xisuma, how his eyes had glowed slightly in the dark. It was so unexpected and he’d gotten so angry and afraid that his feelings had just taken over completely. Sighing he leaned back against the wall, his hands resting on his tattered jeans.

He hadn’t meant to hit the blonde, he was just so upset and he didn’t know how to deal with any of it. 

After Grian had stormed off with Mumbo just behind him Doc had broken down in tears. He’d sunk down to the ground as shivers racked his body. The others had been visibly upset as well, poor X had been so afraid, and his sight still hadn’t come back. 

The threat about the watchers hung over his mind like a stone. Just hearing that they somehow were transported into Minecraft had messed with his mind so much, and now seeing one of his friends be potentially permanently blinded made him even more upset. 

From behind he could hear grass getting trampled as someone made their way towards him. Glancing up he spotted Bdubs who slid down next to him. 

“You feeling better goat man?” He asked, looking over at Doc. 

He could tell that he’d been crying as well, his eyes were red and puffy and his dark hair was sticking up in clumps. His white shirt had been stained with dirt, and he’d pulled down his headband so it was hanging from his neck. 

“Not really” he answered, “how’s Xisuma?” 

“He’s feeling better, still can’t see though.” Bdubs hesitated for a moment before turning his body towards doc.

“I’m so afraid doc, I don’t know what’s going on and I want to go home. What if I never get to see my family again?” As he finished the last word tears fell from his eyes.

Silently doc shifted closer to the other and wrapped his strange arms around him. He could feel Bdubs tensing at the sudden hug, but quickly relaxed and sunk into Doc’s arms.

“I’m afraid too dubs” 

=========

Far away a creature chuckled, it’s mouth twisting into a mad grin. It’s long pale hair fell over its face where a white mask was resting. 

“Poor souls” another said, it was shorter than the first one, it’s skin not quite as pale and it’s hair was brown, giving a rather human looking appearance. It walked up beside the other, both of them were wrapped in large purple robes, their wings reaching high towards the ceiling. 

“Poor souls?” The first one asked, “it’s his fault, not ours.” 

“Yes, that’s true.” Pausing for a moment it turned to look at the other. “Why do we do this?”

Silence filled the air as it thought about the question. 

“Because if we don’t” it said in a low voice, “we’ll have to answer to him”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello! So sorry about the long wait, I’ve had an absolutely terrible time since last time and I’m also currently at day 18 of work (out of 28) so I’m extremely tired, but I finally finished this!
> 
> I wanted to ask if anyone has an idea for a better title for the story? I know the current one is bad cause I honestly had no idea what to call it so I just wrote something lol, so if you have an idea please tell me!
> 
> And I hope you enjoyed this chapter! I’ll try to get the other one out a bit quicker, but can’t promise anything cause I’m very tired as I said, but yeah, hope you liked it and I’ll see y’all next time!


	9. Please!!

The sun was shining upon the district where the hermits reside, the golden rays making its way into the building and reflecting of the diamond throne in the middle of the room, littering the walls with rainbows. 

“So you used the commands yesterday?” Iskall said. He was sitting on a chair beside the bed where both Xisuma and Keralis were sitting. Beside Iskall, Scar was pacing back and forth, lost in thoughts. 

“Yeah, I made it rain” X said, his grip on Keralis’ arm tighten, his white eyes giving of a subtle glow.

“Hm” Keralis softly stroked his hand up and down Xs arm as the hermits think.

“That.. dream you had?” Iskall mutters, “what happened exactly?” He asked, his brows furrowed. 

Xisuma thought for a moment, the dream still fresh in his mind and made shivers crawl up his back.

“Well,” he begun, “I was in a castle I think, it was very big, lots of long dark hallways.  
I was walking around, trying to find someone, or something” he paused, his breath getting faster.

“I saw a.. thing? It was tall, had purple wings, I think it was a Watcher” he shrugged, “it was talking to Grian anyway” 

“It was talking to Grian??” Iskall interrupted, his eyes narrowed in suspicion.

Xisuma nods, “I didn’t quite catch everything, but I remember Grian seemed scared, his hands were trembling”

His brows furrow as he remembers the next scene. 

“I tried to walk closer, but then the room went dark.” He paused for a moment. “The last thing I remember is it saying “They will find out, cause we’re coming” he shuddered at the last sentence, the hair on his arms standing on end.

Keralis gives his arm a squeeze of reassurance, and he pulls his legs underneath him, shifting closer to keralis. 

“It must have been the watchers then” Scar pointed out, stopping his pacing.

“That’s bad isn’t it?” Iskall asked.

Beside him X could feel Keralis shift.

“What the Watcher said, ‘they will find out’ it must have been talking about us right? What will we find out?” The hermits went quiet, though Xisuma could practically hear the gears turning in their heads as they thought about the question. 

“Well I bet there is one person here that knows” Scar says finally, X can hear a soft pair of footsteps making their way across the hall. As they got closer he could make out both Grian and Mumbos voice.

Beside him he could feel Keralis waving his hand to get Mumbo and Grian to come over. The pair said their greetings, though no one answered. Instead The hermits fixed Grian with a cold glare. 

“Is something wrong?” He asked uncertainly. 

Keralis laughed at that, his body slightly shaking. “Is something wrong!? Yes! Of course! X is blind if you hadn’t forgotten!!” X tensed beside him, shocked by his sudden outburst.

“What did the watcher mean when it said we will find out??” He asks bluntly, making Grian step back.

“What- what do you mean?” He stutters, his eyes flickering between the hermits.

Keralis scoffs and rolls his eyes, “don’t pretend you don’t know, X saw you talking to that watcher” he growled. “So spit it out, what does it mean?”

Grians eyes narrow “Nothing, it meant nothing” 

“Yeah, and I’m a tree” Scar huffed, “come on, we just want to know what’s going on”

The bed shifted beside X and he sinks down into the fluffy mattress as Keralis stood up. He surged forward towards Grian and grabbed him by the collar of his shirt, his eyes blazing with fury. Pulling Grian close and staring him straight in the eyes. 

“Why is X blind!? What aren’t you telling us!?” He yelled, making Grian flinch where he stood. Grian grabbed Keralis by the arms, tears forming in his eyes.

“I’m so sorry” he cried, squeezing his eyes shut. “I’m sorry, I never meant to hurt anyone!! I’m sorry you all got here and I’m sorry I can’t figure out how to end this!!” 

Grians legs buckled beneath him as his emotions spill over, his breath coming in short gasps.

Xs brows furrowed in sympathy at the man, he must have gone through so much, and X truly beloved that it wasn’t Grians fault.

Soft steps were heard as Iskall made his way over to Keralis and put his hand on his shoulder. 

“Dude, calm down, this is not the way to do things” 

“It doesn’t help to argue, we are here now, and we have to work together.” He said, looking at the others, a smile creeping at the edge of his lips.

He crouched down to the floor where Grian was sitting and he carefully placed his hands on his shoulders. Grian looked up and wiped his face on his sleeve, His eyes meeting Iskalls kind gaze. 

“I’m not happy with what’s going on” His tone suddenly serious, “but we need you, and you need us, so let’s get on our feet and figure this out together? No one is in this alone.” 

Grian nodded in agreement, his body filling with new determination, and the two stand up. 

Xisuma shifts on the bed, pulling his legs closer and the others look towards him.

“That was sweet” he smiles, trying to face where he thinks Iskall is standing.

“Thanks” Iskall said, scratching the back of his neck, “don’t know where that came from”

“Guess we should call a meeting then?”

============

Low talking could be heard echoing through the large pale building where the hermits assembled. Wels was sitting near the end where Iskall was standing, nervously rubbing his hands. The heavy iron armor he usually wore was stored away underneath his bed, he’d taken it of the day before shortly after the first meeting. The armor was uncomfortable and he’d rather not carry all that weight around at all times. Now he was sporting a gray sweater and pants which he’d been wearing underneath the armor.

Iskall quickly clears his throat before he starts talking. 

“So, as you all know we have a bit of a situation” several of the hermits nodded in agreement. 

“There aren’t really any good news, but at least X isn’t any worse.” He says, getting a few sighs in return. X was sitting beside Keralis, still holding the others hand. Wels could tell Keralis was tired, there was dark bags under his eyes and his face showed no emotions. He had probably been up all night worrying about X, as far as Wels could tell the two hadn’t split up since the incident. Though he though it was nice of Keralis he also knew the hermit needed sleep, he couldn’t go on for long if he didn’t take care of himself. 

Sighing he drew his gaze away from the pair, turning his attention back to Iskall. 

“We do have a new piece of information, though it isn’t good. These watchers that Grian was talking about” he gestures to the blonde, who shifted in his seat, eyes planted on the table. “They are coming for us” he finished firmly, his lips pressed together tightly. With a sigh Grian stood up, grabbing at his sweater as he prepared himself.

“I had a dream-“

“What’s so important about a dream??” One of the hermits interrupted. Wels facepalmed, Grian never seemed to get a break, and looking over at the blonde he could tell he was getting sick of the interruptions as well.

“Will you shut up for one moment!?” He snapped, silencing the room with his sudden outburst. 

“Sorry”. Clearing his throat he continued, “as I said, I had a dream, and in the dream I met a Watcher” he narrowed his eyes, his gaze drifting across the hermits, daring anyone to interrupt him one more time. 

“I’ve met it before, when I was with them” shivers creeped up Wels’ back, making the hair on his arms stand on end.

“It didn’t tell me much, but it said they are coming for us”

Beside Grian, Iskall cleared his throat.

“Xisuma also had a similar dream before- well you know.” His gaze rested on X for a moment, before he took a deep breath and continued.

“We believe it was the watchers who blinded X, and since we know they are coming, whatever that means, they could potentially hurt more of us, which means we need to be ready” with that he sat down, his eyes serious as he looked at the hermits. 

Wels looked around, at the others, ideas already swimming in their eyes and he could practically hear the gears turning in their heads.

“We should build a bunker then!” Impulse said from the other side of the table, “one equipped with everything we could possibly need?”

“Yeah!” Tangos red eyes shone, a grin plastered on his face, “we could have traps, moving walls, armor stations, all those sort of things.”

“We could make it all cozy and nice!” Bdubs piped, his gaze flickering back and forth. 

Wels smiled as his friends all came with different ideas, he knew it was a definite positive that all of them had different skills and strengths, and it would surely help them in the difficult times they were about to face.

At the head of the table Iskall was wearing a wide grin.

“Let’s get to work then” 

============

Purple light danced in front of Grian as he stood before the portal. It’s been months since he’d been through one of those, and even then he only had one goal in mind. Get in, get the blaze rods, and get out. This time however, was different.

Beside him stood four other players, ready and kitted out with weapons and armor, bracing themselves for whatever lay behind the purple veil.

With a final deep breath he raised his head and stepped through the portal. For a moment he felt dizzy, his vision swimming as the world around him disappeared. After a moment his vision cleared, and he stepped down from the obsidian frame. Heat immediately washed over his body, making him sweat underneath the armor he was wearing. 

During the meeting they had split everyone up in groups based on their strengths to plan out who would do what for the bunker. Grian had been placed with the builders, just like he’d been in Evo, along with a few others and they had already come up with a few suitable designs. Though they needed materials for it. 

Looking around what should’ve been familiar terrain he halted, confusion clouding his gaze. He quickly scanned the area, which was a strange shade of blue. He could tell the hermits had built it, but the blocks they had used were unfamiliar to him.

“What the hell, what is this?” He asked, gesturing to the surrounding area. “I mean I figured the game must have gotten updated, but this is not what I imagined”

“Its the new nether update, pretty sweet” Wels said. 

Cautiously he walked towards the edge of the structure and the sight before him made him gasp in awe. The terrain was completely different, there seemed to be different biomes, different mobs, and new ores. He could see what looked like a forest, red and blue trees littering the floor of the dimension. 

“Wow” he breathed, no words could explain what he was feeling, seeing a place he’d grown so used to looking completely transformed was incredible. 

“There is this new material, called netherite” Etho mentioned, “you can use it to upgrade your diamond tools and armor, but it’s super rare” he pointed towards the dark purple armor they were wearing.

“Cool” Grian nodded, the gears turning in his brain as he thought about this new information.

Together they made their way down to the forest, all of them looking around in awe.

“This is amazing” False whispered, her eyes wide as she spun around, taking in the sight.

Grian chuckled, it was amazing indeed. Turning around he spotted a large creature, it looked like a large hog, its white eyes staring towards them.

“What’s that?” He pointed towards the creature, the others turned to where he was pointing. Falses smile immediately turned into a frown.

“Look out!” She yelled, as the hog turned and ran towards them. 

Grian adjusted his feet and waited, time seemingly standing still as the large creature came closer and closer.  
Behind him he could hear the hermits scramble out of the way, yelling at him to get back. As the hog reached his side he stepped out of the way, making it halt and twist its large body, but before it could start running again Grian dashed forward, slid underneath the beast and dug his sword deep into its belly.  
It’s shriek was abruptly cut off as it poofed, leaving behind a few raw pork chops.

“How did you learn how to do that?” 

Behind him the hermits we’re slowly approaching, their gazes flickering around looking for any more dangers that might be lurking.

“I’ve been here for five years remember? We didn’t exactly sit around doing nothing” he shrugged, and wiped off the blood left on his sword with a nearby vine.

“Anyway, what was that thing?” He asked, raising a brow.

“That” false shuddered, “was a hoglin, they are aggressive creatures, but they do drop food as you saw which is cool I guess.” She crossed her arms, letting her sword hang towards the ground.

“Huh”

Things sure had changed. 

Turning around he continued along the ‘path’ they had been walking on, the others following along just behind him. Carefully keeping a lookout for more hostile mobs.

They walked for quite a while, passing different biomes, stopping to gather resources and admire the view.  
Grian was amazed by all the changes, he had some vague memories of people talking about this update, though he didn’t remember any specifics. 

It was strange, that he had lived for 5 years longer than everyone else. Technically he was 32 now, but since time apparently had gone much slower in the real world he was still 27.  
His brows furrowed at the thought. It was nice, in a way, that 5 years hadn’t passed. Since a lot can happen in such a long time.

He wondered about his family, how they had reacted, and what had happened to him when he’d gotten in? Did he just disappear? Or was he in a coma somewhere, waiting for someone to pull the plug. 

Shaking his head he shoved his hands deep into his pockets, banishing the thoughts before he’d start crying again. The others had seen him crying enough since they had met.

He stopped abruptly when he bumped into Iskalls back, making the taller man jump where he stood. 

“What- oh” 

In front of them was a huge lava lake, Grian could spot several creatures walking along the fiery substance, seemingly not bothered by the heat.

“Jesus that’s a long way down”

Grian nodded in agreement, taking a few steps back from the edge. Across the lake he could see a big rectangular black structure of some kind.

“What’s that?” He asked pointing towards the structure, making the others turn towards it. 

“That’s a bastion!” Iskall piped, excitement shining in his eyes. 

“Sweet! We could raid that and get some free loot!” False was standing on the edge, not bothered at all by the long drop right below her feet. 

Wels, however was standing far from the edge, his yes flashing with uncertainty. 

“I don’t really fancy being roasted today” he said, “why don’t we just mine for some more netherite and then call it a day?”

“Aw come on!” Iskall pouted, “it’ll be fun! And I’ve never seen a bastion from this perspective before” 

“None of us have dude” False chuckled, she’d moved away from the edge and the five of them were standing in a half circle, their eyes fixed on the Bastion. 

“I just have a bad feeling okay?”

Grian looked across the lake. He’d bridged across lava hundreds of times, fought in countless fortresses, and not once had he died. Still he did have a creeping feeling that something was off. 

“Its probably nothing, and we will be super careful” Etho looked as eager as Iskall to cross over to the bastion. “Let’s just have some fun for today okay?” He put his hand on Wels’ shoulder and gave him a kind smile. 

Grian thought it was strange, how some of the hermits skins directly opposed their personalities. Like Cleo, who was not pretty to look at, but was a really genuine and nice person, and Tango, who nobody could look in the eyes was super fun and nice to be around. 

Etho wasn’t that different, but with one red and one blue eye he did have quite a striking look. One would definitely not think he was a kindhearted and gentle person when you first saw him. 

After a moment Wels nodded in determination, and the others cheered as they started bridging across the lake. 

Grian, False and Iskall was on lookout duty, their bows strung tightly as they slowly made their way forward. At the front, Wels and Etho were building a double bridge, so that they had more room to stand on and less of a chance of falling to their death, which wasn’t preferable.

About halfway cold shivers went up Grians back and his vision went fuzzy for a moment. A sharp breath escaped his body and he twisted around, looking around for a threat. 

“You good?” Beside him Iskall raises a brow, tightening his grip on the bow in case something was wrong.

“I think something is-“ before he could finish the sentence laughter sounded behind him and he quickly turned, his breath coming in short gasps. Cold sweat dripped down his face as he recognized the laugh he’d heard so many times before.

“Having fun?” As the voice spoke the world around him went dark, and he stumbled forward, crashing into another person. 

“Hello!?” He said, fear shaking his body. Faintly, he heard his name be spoken, and he turned towards the sound, his bow still strung, knuckles turning white as he gripped the shaft tighter. 

A hand grabbed his shoulder and he screamed, twisting towards the person he saw a black figure, it’s white eyes glowing in the dark and without a second thought he fired.

The arrow flew through the air and landed with a soft thud. The air silent as Grians vision went back to normal.

“No” he whispered.

“Not again, please don’t let this happen again” he wailed, falling down to his knees and dropping the bow.

In front of him stood Etho, his face lit with shock as he stared at Grian, the arrow lodged into his shoulder between the two pieces of armor. 

“You- You shot me?” He stuttered, his hand reaching up to pull out the arrow, blood already welling out of the wound.

Behind him Wels screamed.

“Etho!!” He rushed forward, pushing past Grian to try and reach his friend. 

“Wels?” Tears well out of Ethos eyes as he reached for the knight, his legs buckled underneath him and he slowly fell backwards off the edge.  
With one final effort Wels threw himself forward, desperately grasping the air for Ethos hand, but he missed. Barely grazing the others outstretched fingertips.

Grian watches in horror as Etho fell, slowly, towards certain death.

Around him he could hear the wails of the others as they scream for their friend. 

He knows nothing can be done now. 

He’s lost another. 

And it was all his fault.

Ethos eyes close for a final time right before his body hits the lava, swiftly sinking into the depths below.

Shock fills the hermits minds as they stare at the place Etho fell.

And as one the WOC’s on their wrists vibrate, displaying a message no one wanted to see.

“Etho tried to swim in lava”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello! I’m finally home after working 28 days straight which was exhausting, but the paycheck this month is going to be epic tho :3
> 
> Anyway, thank you for all the name suggestions! I’ll probably take some time before I decide, but it’ll happen within the next few updates at least. 
> 
> Also sorry about this chapter lamo, I just love making people hurt :D  
> (And it’s not getting better any time soon heheh)
> 
> So yeah, let me know what you think and as always thank you so much for reading!


	10. They are splitting up

“Murderer!!” Wels screamed, tears streaming down his face. Getting up he ran towards Grian, who easily evaded him. 

“You don’t understand!” He cried, “There was a Watcher! I swear I didn’t mean to shoot him!” Grian’s face twisted inn anguish as he stared at the hermits, desperately trying to get them to understand. 

“He’ll never be back will he?” False whispered, “There is no respawn in this is there?” Her voice broke and she buried her face in Iskalls shoulder, sobbing quietly. 

“I’m starting to think these watchers aren’t the ones we should be afraid of” Wels spat.

Grian’s arms dropped helplessly against his sides, he knew there was no justification for what he’d done, but still hearing the hermits talk to him like that made his heart break.

“Let’s just get out of here” Iskall said, his voice cold and his eyes dark, Grian could tell by his trembling hands he was trying hard to hold back his fury. 

Lowering his gaze he followed the others, False coming in behind him making sure he didn’t put a foot out of place. 

He still couldn’t believe the watchers would pull the same move on him twice, but he guessed they wanted to turn everyone against him. Though he didn’t know why they wanted that. Actually, he didn’t know why they did anything. 

The image of Taurtis’ horrified expression as he fell to the ground lingered in his mind, would the same fate come to all he met? Was he destined to live through his worst nightmare til the end of time?

The air around him turned cool as they stepped through the portal, his vision swimming for a second before he felt solid ground under his feet and stepped forward into the street, fresh air 

His eyes were planted at the ground while they walked up the stairs towards the others, each step felt heavy, as if the earth was pulling him down. 

It might as well have, because when they reached the top he could tell things had not been silent here either. Cleo and Bdubs were standing at the door, eyes red from crying. As they spotted them climbing the stairs they called out a greeting. 

“Was the trip alright?” Cleo asked, her hands gripping Bdubs’ arm tightly. 

“No” Iskall responded as they reached the top. His eyes flashing between Grian and the others. “We lost Etho” he sighed, wiping away a few tears that were forming at the edges of his eyes.

Cleo looked at them in horror, thick black tears streamed down her face and she leaned over, holding Bdubs in a tight grip as she sobbed.

“We lost people too” Bdubs stated bluntly, his usually upbeat and cheerful persona replaced with a numb face. His arms hung limply at his sides and his dark hair stuck out in clumps. 

“We don’t know what happened, but one moment everything was okay, and the next we were surrounded by screaming and shadows and people. The wind was blowing like crazy and when it calmed down-“ he paused, his gaze drifting across the hermits. Taking a deep breath he continued. 

“They just disappeared, poof, just like that” his gaze dropped to the floor, fists clenched tightly against his sides “TFC, Zedaph, Joe, Hypno, all gone” 

Silence hung in the air.  
“We need to leave now” Iskall whispered with gritted teeth.

Grian stared at him, hands running across the blade at his side. Dark images filled his mind, a barren field, remains of an unfair fight strewn across the ground in front of him. Dead faces twisted in horror as they took their final breath. 

“We can’t hide,” he raised his head, the world bright again. Iskalls blue gaze pierced his own. 

“What else can we do? You said it yourself, we can’t fight, so what else is there to do?” 

Grian looked away, not sure how to answer. 

Iskalls gaze hardened, “We’re going, now” With that he walked off towards the other hermits inside the building.

False looked at him, her brows furrowed. “Sorry man, I got to stick with my friends.” 

Bdubs shot him an apologetic look, while Wels scowled at him, both walking into the building.

Grian’s face fell in disappointment, was he not a friend?

Should’ve known better. 

His hands shook as he stared at the ground beneath him. Wishing more than ever that it would just end, that he could just leave.

“Hey what’s going on”

Looking up he spotted Mumbo standing in front of him, his warm brown eyes glanced between him and the other hermits. 

Grian’s shoulders sank and a heavy sigh escaped his lips. “They don’t want me here.” 

“Why not? You’re great?” His brows furrowed in confusion, “What happened?” 

“Same thing as before” he sighed, sitting down on the sandy steps, Mumbo quickly following. “We lost Etho, I shot him.” Tears began forming in his eyes at the fresh memory. 

Can’t believe I still have tears to shed, thought they would be all dried out by now.

Beside him he could feel Mumbo’s shocked gaze as the words sank in.

“Why- why did you shoot him?” He stuttered, eyes still planted on Grian’s face. 

Because I’m a monster 

“Because I saw a watcher, we were bridging across a lava lake, I panicked and just acted, but when I looked up I had shot Etho, he fell backwards and there was nothing we could do.” He shook at the words, anger boiling his blood. 

“Oh” 

He hates me 

“I don’t hate you” 

Yes you do

“We’re going to get them back,” Grian looked up at Mumbo, tears blurring the black haired man's face. 

Without hesitating Mumbo grabbed Grian’s shoulders and looked him straight in the eyes. His brows furrowing in determination. 

“We’ll find a way, and we will get them back.” 

Grian nodded hesitantly, not knowing how to respond to the sudden serious outburst. 

“I- I really hope so” 

======================

Inside the building tension was rising, Wels could feel the blood in his veins boiling as the confusion and grief turned to anger and denial. 

I was so close

Squeezing his eyes shut he tried to get the image of Ethos face out of his mind. He’d looked so shocked, his eyes had locked with Wels as he slowly fell backwards, tears running down his cheeks.

I should’ve been quicker

Around him the room buzzed with whispers, sobbing, confusion and fear. 

“Hey Wels-“ Jevin came up behind him, and laid a blue slimy hand on his shoulder, Cleo and Doc appearing beside him. 

“Get off!” He jumped, wiping the cold slimy substance of his sweater. “Ugh that’s disgusting dude.” Frowning he looked up at Jevin, who stared at him with wide eyes. 

“Wow, that’s kinda harsh don’t you think.” He said, raising an eyebrow.

“Sorry, but I mean it is true” Wels chuckled, scratching the back of his neck. 

“What the hell?” Doc stepped forward, his brows furrowed in both confusion and anger. “Don’t you think it’s hard for us to look like this??” He spat, his red eye glowing brighter. “This is not a joke, what would you feel if you got sucked into a game and suddenly look nothing like a regular human, I mean you practically look the same!” His gaze flickered between Jevin and Cleo who looked equally hurt by the words. 

Before he could respond Tango walked up from where he had been chatting with Impulse and Beef.

‘’Whats up? Why are you yelling so much?’’ His bright gaze flickered between them, his spiky teeth flashed in a wide grin. 

‘’This moron over here’’ Doc motioned to Wels, who crossed his arms in dissatisfaction. ‘’Thinks that we are disgusting cause of our skins’’

‘’I did not-’’ 

‘’Did you mean it?’’ Cleo asked, sounding hurt. ‘’I mean we can’t really help how we look’’

Tangos brows furrowed ‘’Well, that's not entirely true, we could have chosen different skins’’ He shrugged, trying to ease the tension that was building in the air. 

Doc was glaring at Wels, his red eye glowing bright with anger, and his fists were clenched. ‘’I don’t think you want us here do you?’’ he asked, his voice almost a growl. ‘’Because we look so disgusting you want us to leave, don’t you?’’ He took a threatening step forward, slowly closing the gap between them. Wels hands shook slightly as Doc stared down at him.

‘’Maybe we should just leave then, if we are so hideous that you don't even want to look at us’’ Doc whispered softly, stiffening as he waited for Wels’ reply. 

Wels stared up at him, not knowing how to respond. how was he supposed to explain that he did think they were difficult to look at without them getting even more angry and upset? 

Before he could reply Doc nodded silently, stepping away and resting a hand on Cleo’s shoulder.  
‘’I see how it is’’ he said, his voice hollow. ‘’Come on, lets go.’’ With that they walked away, Tango staying a second longer, his piercing gaze seemingly staring straight into Wels’ soul. 

====================

‘’They are splitting up’’ 

‘’They can't put their differences aside’’

‘’Just like you said would happen’’

‘’This is why we must hurt them.’’

‘’Yes, show them how to work together’’

‘’We’re helping them’’

‘’Yes’’...‘’I see what you mean now’’

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello!! I am finally back. 
> 
> I'm so sorry this chapter took so long, honestly I just didn't know what to write and ended up putting it away to see if inspiration struck as I didn't want to just force out a crappy chapter. (not that this is a masterpiece either, but ya know) 
> 
> Also thanks for all the love while I was away! you definitely didn't let me forget about this thing by the amounts of kudos I was getting! also the amounts of hits just feels so unreal, just, thank you so much. 
> 
> Anyway enough with the sappy stuff. I quickly wanted to explain that some of the reason this chapter took so long is because I came to the point where I had to include more and more people, and I just don't have the time to watch them all and get to know their personalities. also I find it hard to include that many people. so as you saw I solved the problem :)))
> 
> Lol 
> 
> Oh and lastly! The fic got a new name! you all had great suggestions, but i ended up going with ‘’This Isn't home anymore’’ which was suggested by ‘Silverwing’ so thank you so much for that!
> 
> Phew, I think that was all? hopefully I’ll see you again soon!


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